The prescribing of psychotropic drugs in mental health services in Trinidad

Objective: To describe, analyze, and interpret patterns of psychotropic drug prescribing in new psychiatric patients attending psychiatric outpatients clinics in the Caribbean island of Trinidad. Design and Methods: This was a cross-sectional study of psychotropic drug prescribing by psychiatrists for 132 new psychiatric outpatients who were seen at the outpatient clinics surveyed and who were entering the mental health system during the period of research, November 1998 through February 1999. Results: A single patient could be prescribed more than one psychotropic drug. Antidepressant drugs were the class of psychotropic drugs most prescribed (70 of 132 patients, 59.8 percent), followed by antipsychotropic drugs (67 of 132 patients, 50.8 percent). Tricyclic antidepressants (TCAs) were the antidepressants most prescribed (58 of the 79 patients), mainly amitriptyline (53 of the 58). Fluoxetine was the only selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) prescribed (21 of the 79 patients prescribed antidepressants). Of the 67 patients receiving antipsychotic drugs, phenothiazines accounted for 41 of those 67, including trifluoperazine (14 of the 41) and thioridazine (13 of the 41). The individual antipsychotic most prescribed was sulpiride (21 of the 67 patients). Anticholinergic drugs were prescribed to 20 of the 132 patients (15.1 percent). Eighty-three of the patients were prescribed more than one drug concomitantly (either more than one psychotropic or a combination of psychotropic(s) and nonpsychotropic(s). Prescription by ethnicity, age, and gender coincided with the morbidity rates encountered in these patients. The prescribing of SSRIs to persons of African or East Indian ethnicity was significantly lower than it was for persons of mixed heritage. Conclusions: The prescription patterns of psychotropic drugs in Trinidad revealed the psychiatrists' preferences for traditional psychotropic drugs, the moderate use of anticholinergic drugs, and polypharmacy in some cases, with probable predisposition to adverse drug reactions. Given our results and based on the evaluation of the individual patients, consideration should be given to a broader use of the newer antidepressants (SSRIs) and antipsychotics. Unless justified, polypharmacy should be avoided (AU)

Ethnic differences in substance use and alcohol-use-related mortality among first generation migrants to England and Wales

Epidemiological studies among migrant ethnic groups are potentially important as a way to provide insight into the relative importance of genetic, cultural, and socioeconomic factors in the etiology of substance use disorders. This paper summarizes prior United Kingdom studies of the prevalence of substance-use-associated problems in different ethnic groups before analyzing trends in recent mortality data by country of birth. On this evidence, rates of alcohol-related mortality may be marginally higher for those born in the Caribbean than for the native British, but are substantially raised for those born in Ireland and the Indian subcontinent. There is some indication that rates for the Caribbean and possibly the Irish groups have risen more rapidly than for the national population over a 12-year period. These difference in mortality rates seem to have arisen for complex reasons.(AU)